


Nothing Sweeter

by Andettan



Category: Hazbin Hotel (Web Series)
Genre: Accidental Serial Killer OC, Asexuality, Comedy, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Romance, Yeah that's right in this house we suffer
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-03
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-09-06 01:13:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,022
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16822165
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Andettan/pseuds/Andettan
Summary: You’re just a small town southern girl who got put in a bad spot. It’s not your fault you ended up on an accidental cross-country murder spree. Quite frankly, you’re only half as offended by the increasing body count as you are by the people ranting about the depraved “Highway Butcher”. In any case, you lived your life with only the best of intentions, which is why it is such bullshit that you find yourself waking up in Hell.Your name is Honey, and you’re a jackrabbit demon; dead at 19 and now a perpetually stressed but upbeat denizen of Hell. When another extermination demolishes the cafe you work at, you get a position as cook at the Happy Hotel. It’s a matter of moments before you first meet the infamous Radio Demon and find yourself reluctantly charmed. To everyone’s surprise (including his own), Alastor is likewise smitten, but despite your fledgling romance, plots against you are brewing from enemies both old and new.Or: In which you fall in love only to fall to pieces under the weight of past sins. If only someone were there to break your fall. (There isn’t.)





	1. The Beginning (And An End)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello, all! Welcome to my worst nightmare, where a cool concept enters my brain and haunts me until I write it. Still, I'm super pumped for this story, so I hope you enjoy!

Looking back, you were one of very few fortunate people who had a good and loving childhood. Growing up on a small homestead, your parents were deeply in love and doted on you, their only child. Your little home was often filled with the heady scent of your mother’s cooking and the many candles she would light. Your father would often take you hunting for jackrabbits and you’d spend long days bonding and rolling around in the forest before returning to your mother covered in dirt. More often than not the evenings were spent laughing as your mother would “force” your dad to dance with her to the same old Jazz and Swing records she’d inherited from your grandfather, who’d died many years before.

Your early years were filled with warm memories and the only sort of trouble you’d get into was taking too long to come in from the woods for dinner. Then when you were seven, your mom fell ill. What seemed like a normal cold slowly morphed into an unceasing breakdown of your mother’s health. Her spirit was undiminished, but those nightly dance sessions became evenings of sitting by her side on the couch, playing board games as the records played away softly in the background. Her smile grew frail, and as the years ticked by, you watched her fade away.

It was a cozy autumn night when it happened. She was resting on her bed as you sat beside her. She squeezed your hand and said, “Honey bun?”

“Yes, mama,” you answered.

“We both know I’m heading somewhere you ain’t allowed to follow,” she whispered wryly, “So promise me somethin’ won’t you, pumpkin.”

“You’re not gonna go anywhere,” you answered, ten years old and stubborn enough to fight death itself if it’d spare your mom.

She laughed and her eyes flashed with the intensity that you thought had been taken from her already. Your mom loved to prove people wrong.

“Well, you’re gonna promise me anyways,” she said. “You’re gonna promise me that you won’t end up like your momma. When you know that some sorta end is comin’ your way, you stand tall and go down swingin’.” She then sat up and gripped your shoulders, her expression feverish with abrupt passion.

“You don’t let anyone bring you down, honey. And if you ever gotta burn some bridges, burn ‘em down with the people who would hurt you still crossin’.”

Her words were as confusing to you as they were frightening, but under her fierce gaze you couldn’t do anything but nod. Satisfied, your mother kissed your forehead and sent you off to bed. By morning she was gone.

To your father’s credit, though he mourned deeply, he kept himself together for your sake. Your days were quieter, the house less warm, but every night he would bring out your mom’s old records and let the crackling sounds of old time-y jazz fill the gaps that her absence left. Years passed, and everything seemed to settle. You were graduating from the local high school a year early with the class of 1996, but planned to get a job in town to keep your dad company rather than head off to college right away. He tried to convince you otherwise, but he didn’t try very hard. Finally, you put your foot down and said if he wanted you to go he’d have to kick you out of the house.

He laughed, with a look of bittersweet fondness on his face and conceded. “You remind me too much of your mother sometimes, honey. But you worry twice as much as she ever did.”

You make a point to sound over the top offended and shoot back, “Well, I’m worrying for the both of us then, pops!” and stomp back inside. You can’t hide your smile as your dad’s laughter follows you all the way back.

* * *

Overall, despite the minor tragedy of your mother’s death, you lived an average life as a small town southern girl whose worst offense was reflexively hitting a classmate after he’d stepped on your foot; Which is why it made no sense that you were waking up in a dank basement with your hands bound behind your back and the taste of copper on your tongue.

The last thing you can remember is catching a ride from someone in town. Your memory is fuzzy, but you get flashes of what appears to be a large man. There’s an argument, when he drives past your stop, a struggle, which you were losing but made him bleed over. You think you remember being hit in the head, but past that there’s nothing. Honestly, you’re straight up the stereotypical southern bimbo who doesn’t know better than to get in a car with a stranger. Given that you’ve probably been kidnapped, you decide to scream internally later and try to escape now.

Just as you start to twist at the rope behind you, the door to the basement opens and floods the room with light. You wince as your vision adjusts, and once it does you’re met with the leering visage of the middle aged trucker who’d kidnapped you.

“Hey there lil’ lady,” he smirks, looming over you. Trembling with a heady cocktail of fear, rage, and confusion, you work on autopilot.

“Eat shit, creep,” you snarl, and spit in his face. He rears back in disgust and wipes red away from his face. He backhands you a split second later and sends you to the floor. You realize somewhat dazedly that the copper taste in your mouth before must’ve been your own blood. Your surroundings are swimming around you and hear the man sneer out insults and depraved descriptions of his plans for your body and eventual corpse.

You think you ought to be paying more attention, but everything is distant, as if you were underwater trying to make out sounds. You probably have a concussion, you decide. The plus side is that you don’t have to hear this creepy jackass threaten to rape you. The downside is that you can’t concentrate for shit and that’s really important when escaping creepy jackass rapists. Eventually the guy seems to realize you’re not in any position to give a crap about his threats and leaves, presumably to come back later once you’re able to “put on a real show”, he says.

The moment the door above slams shut, you shift onto your knees, and, ignoring the pain and disorientation, start looking around for something to cut the ropes binding you. It takes you maybe ten minutes of crawling around quietly looking for something sharp before you realize you’re actually in handcuffs, not ropes. This concussion sucks.

Thankfully, there’s an easy solution to being handcuffed. Ideally, you’d have something to pick these cuffs with. Also, in an ideal world you’d have the first clue on how to pick handcuffs. Instead, you spend several excruciating moments dislocating your left thumb through brute force. You muffled your scream by biting down on your cheek, inevitably flooding your mouth with more blood. Slipping the cuff off, you bring your hands around front and grit your teeth as you forcibly relocate the thumb. On a rack nearby are various implements, probably intended for some kind of sexual torture, but they looked metal and sturdy. With one hand now free, you bashed one into your ankle cuffs until they broke. The second the link breaks, you drag yourself onto your feet and stumble quickly up the stairs.

The door is latched from the outside but frankly you’re tired and in pain and you’d be damned before you let a a wooden door get in your way. You take off your shirt and wrap your knuckles. If the guy hasn’t heard you before, he’ll definitely hear you now, but you still wind your fist back and smash into the wood above the handle. You bang into the wood with loud repeated thuds and you hear distant swearing, but it proves to be the push you need. You finally smash right through the wood and fumble to unlatch the door from the other side.

You stagger through the doorway and know you have probably seconds to get away before the man gets to you. Rather than take your chances fleeing with a concussion, you let instinct guide you to the kitchen. The man is stomping down the stairs at full speed as your eyes latch on to the knife block. He’s at the doorway and flings himself at you in rage. You don’t feel anything at all as you whirl around and sink a kitchen knife deep into his chest.

He yells and falls to his knees. It feels as though you’re watching your actions through a screen. As if it was somebody else’s arm who pulled the knife out of the man with a wet sound. As if it were someone else driving the knife back into him over and over. You could pretend you were watching a horror movie where someone else had been taken and tied up and had to stab and stab and stab until what lay in front of them more resembled a freshly skinned deer carcass than a human.

With a soundless gasp, you come back to yourself and fling yourself away from the corpse. You’re trembling so hard you can barely stay standing and you can’t bring yourself to let go of the knife. It takes minutes of you drawing in deep sobs of air before you can calm yourself. The years of immersing yourself in the hunt alongside your father come in handy and you force your nerves to settle. You take stock of your situation. Injury-wise you have a nasty concussion, your thumb is bruised badly, deep splinters are gouged into your right hand, and your teeth are red with blood that is mostly yours, but there is nothing immediately life threatening.

The body in front of you has been slashed and stabbed beyond recognition. Habit seems to have taken over when you were locked into your panic; the man has been skinned in some areas and you’d targeted places with major organs. You realize that nobody will look at that body and call it self-defense; it looked too clinical, premeditated.

You can’t call the police, even to get home. You’re covered in blood and holding the murder weapon in a tight grip. No, you’ll have to get home yourself. You rifle through the cabinets in a daze, hoping to find some kind of indication of where you are. You manage to find some takeout menus and nearly cry. All the addresses are for places in Ohio, states away from your home in Southern Texas. Still, you have to persevere, so you wash off as much of the blood as you can and try to make yourself look presentable. You steal a jacket off the living room couch, and though you’re disgusted by the necessity there’s nothing for it. Deciding to be pragmatic, you rifle through the man's house for his cash and valuables and stash it all in an old rucksack.

Finally, after rifling through paper junk for a while, you find the business card for a taxi service. You call a cab using the receiver in the kitchen to pick you up down the street. Looking back at the puddle of blood that had stopped growing and the slowly cooling corpse above it, you harden your resolve and step over it, making your way out the door. You take the knife with you.

* * *

It’s been a week, and you’re going out of your mind. When you first stepped out of that taxi at the nearest pawn shop, you thought your kidnapper’s valuables would be worth enough to get you home. You were dead wrong, and now you have to choose between rationing what’s left of your cash on food, or spend that last bit on bus tickets and motel rooms. It’s already nerve wracking knowing that each place you visit is one more crumb left for cops to trace back to you. You’ve taken to signing into places under the name Honey. Your mother used to call you her “honey bunny” and the nickname is something small that helps you get through the days.

Still, you won’t be signing in anywhere anymore if you can’t figure out your money issue. With a sigh you come to the conclusion that food is more important than shelter. You could always hitchhike, you guess. Though given how that ended for you last time, you might put that off.

Your first night sleeping rough lives up to the term. You’ve found a nice dry alleyway and you’ve shelled out some extra cash for a thick shawl from a thrift store and settle in for the night. You haven’t been resting for an hour before a drunk passing by sees you and approaches your sleeping form. For reasons unknown, he decides to kick at you. Woken up abruptly and in pain, you lash out at his legs, knife in hand. With a yell, he falls down.

“Th’ fuck you do tha’ for, you bish,” he slurs angrily, reaching out to you, possibly to hit you.

Still in the foggy state of being half-awake and thoroughly frightened, your sluggish mind struggles to process what’s happening. The man hit you, you think, and you’ve stabbed him. He’s still yelling. He needs to be quiet, or people will see, they’ll _know_. You react on autopilot and silence the man. There’s some gurgling before the alley falls silent once more.

You heave a sigh of relief while your mind catches up. A moment later you realize what you’ve done. “Oh, shit,” you whisper to yourself. You just killed another guy. By accident. Sort of. Who even does that? You start laughing hysterically, because it’s either that or scream, but you shut up really quick in case that draws any more attention.

It seems your subconscious has made the decision for you. You’ve killed again, and you really can’t afford any kind of trail right now. That means buses are out, ergo, hitchhiking is the only option left to you. You get to your feet and look over at the second corpse you’ve made out of someone. It’s really really scummy, but you can’t help it, you need cash. Before you can convince yourself otherwise, you strip the body of its valuables (twenty bucks in loose change and some scratch cards), and shuffle out of the alley as nonchalantly as you can manage.

You walk until the city falls behind you and there is only the highway illuminated by the waning moon above. Sighing, you stick out your thumb and wait.

* * *

August 2nd, 1996, you read off the newspaper. Six months since you were taken. You should be graduating by now. Instead, you’re slumming it in Illinois, eighteen years old and smothered by the guilt of the twelve bodies you’ve left in your wake so far. Thankfully, the cops haven’t really been connecting the dots on the string of corpses. You’ve been reading newspapers religiously, making sure that any investigations stay pointed in the wrong directions. You’ve stopped staying in motels entirely. Sleeping on the streets is pretty terrible, but the mere thought of being caught by police because you got complacent terrifies you.

It’s not the best situation, because being a homeless teenage girl makes you a target for a lot of creeps. You tell yourself it’s fine, because you can ignore most of them. You hardly ever stab anybody, really, only if they startle you or grab you from behind, and then you just react instinctively. It’s always an accident, you tell yourself. And so what if you loot their corpses? You need their stuff way more than they do at the moment.

Besides, you’ve never killed someone who didn’t deserve it. They’ve all been terrible people, violent drunks and thugs who frequented the same alleys you’d sleep in and truckers looking to take advantage of a young girl looking for a ride. It’s not like you’d ever kill an innocent.

* * *

“Oh, fuck,” you say in disbelief. Your grip on your trusty kitchen knife is firm as you look down on the helpful bystander you’ve just stabbed. The man had seen you in the alley and stepped in to ask if you were alright, startling you into a reflexive stabbing.

He’s groaning on the floor now, his pressed slacks and quickly reddening button-up a hint that he’d been heading home from work. He’s working to stifle the blood flow, and part of you feels like you should be down there, doing your best to help the Good Samaritan you’ve just injured. Most of you realizes that there’s only one thing to be done now.

You step forward slowly. It’s been a year and a half since Illinois, roughly two years since you were taken. You’re nineteen and your body count is in the dozens. Cops have been catching on, seeing the pattern, what little of one there is. They’ve been tracing the mysterious “Highway Butcher”, whose victims are cut up just a bit too expertly, and they’re only ever a month’s kills behind you lately. You can’t afford an eyewitness.

Kneeling beside the man, you notice he’s young, maybe early twenties. He looks up at your face, hopeful that you’re there to help. Silly, considering you’re the one who stabbed him.

“I’m sorry,” you say, and find yourself meaning it. You really don’t want to do this. As it stands, he’s not fatally injured, you’d just lashed out and caught his side.

“It’s alright, you didn’t mean to, right?” he says earnestly. His voice is strained. This is just the worst situation. You don’t deserve this.

“Yeah,” you give a mirthless smile, your best attempt at comfort. No point in dragging this out. You close your eyes and slash. Blood spills down his throat and you stand smoothly to avoid staining your ratty clothes. You ignore his gasping and keep your eyes down as you rummage through his pockets. You take a nicely thick wallet and leave. He had a fancy watch, but stealing it off of his wrist as he slowly died felt a bit rude.

You leave the alley, lingering outside it until you can’t hear any more wet gasps for breath. Satisfied, though not really satisfied at all, you consider splurging your new cash on some nicer clothes and a good coffee. Far from the crime scene of course, since the alternative would be to dispose of the body. You’d tried once or twice, but lugging around a heavy corpse through the city was neither easy nor subtle. Better to just leave it be.

A week later you end up at a thrift store halfway across the city, you thought to treat yourself to a nice bag and some fancier clothes so you could be blend in at a really nice cafe. A button-up, skirt, long socks, and some ankle boots and suspenders completed the look. You tried to stick to black and red, because those would hide bloodstains the best and really it was a matter of time before that became relevant. On a happier note, the outfit reminded you of your mom, and frankly you could use what little comfort you can get.

A bit more upbeat in clean clothes and sporting a nice messenger bag filled with your old clothes and your trusty knife, you asked directions to the nearest cafe. Upon arrival, you ordered the fanciest drink on the menu and a sandwich and sat down in a nice corner booth. Eating slowly, you savored the feel of a warm meal and the familiar sounds of jazz playing gently in the background. Across the room was a small TV set on a local new channel. This was a nice cafe, and you’ve found that in your slow cross-country trek, Louisiana is your favorite state, if only for the great atmosphere and music.

The door bell jingled and you looked up to see a young girl dragging her father along by the hand. “Hot chocolate!” she cried. “Hot chocolate, daddy, you promised!”

“Alright, alright,” he said, with begrudging fondness, as he ordered at the register. His daughter chattered away at him happily while he tried merrily to keep up. The two get their hot chocolates and leave within a few minutes.

You look away, good mood forgotten. Two years is a long time. By no means should you have taken this long to get home. Honestly, hitchhiking alone would have gotten you home before two months’ end. You tried to tell yourself you were only being careful with your funds, but it was too big a lie. The fact was, you were afraid.

Afraid of what your father would say of your absence, of your sins. But more than that, you were afraid _for_ him. With every kill, the incentive for police to track you down grew. They were determined already, and closer than anyone knew. If you headed home, you’d lead police straight to him and he’d either turn you in or die protecting you. Either would be too much for you to bear. No, it was better to stay away and keep the both of you safe.

In an effort to distract yourself from that train of thought, you take a sip of coffee and focus on the TV. They’d just moved to the crime segment.

“Breaking News,” said the news anchor. “A major break in the case against the Highway Butcher.”

You froze, while the cashier turned up the volume in interest. The anchor went on, miles away and unconcerned with just how inconveniently timed this little segment was for you.

“Contrary to their moniker, it’s a lesser known fact that this killer’s unfortunate victims are not limited to those unfortunate enough to offer them a lift. Many victims fitting this serial killer’s M.O, have been found across alleyways and city outskirts throughout the Eastern United States. Police have attributed roughly forty-seven murders to this person over the course of two years.”

“Unfortunately, the isolated locations an distance between each murder has left no eye-witnesses and too wide a pool of potential suspects, leaving police scrambling to keep up.”

You start to relax, thinking that’s the end of it, besides maybe an update on a month-old death newly attributed to The Highway Butcher.

“Shockingly enough, however, police have found their first lead, right here in Louisiana! An eyewitness who has survived a vicious attack. Robert Santos, 25, was attacked and presumed dead by the serial killer, making him the only known survivor of this monster.”

A picture of the Good Samaritan you’d been losing sleep over pops up on the screen. You choke on your coffee, trying not to spit-take. The image of him is much paler, with dark circles under his eyes and a hideous wound across his throat stitched up with thick thread, but it’s definitely him.

“Miraculously, despite his injuries, Santos was able to describe the killer in detail and helped provide a police sketch of his attacker.” A sketch of you comes on screen. In it, your hair is tangled and your clothes are ratty, but the face is unnervingly accurate.

“Yes, that’s right! It appears that a young woman has become the most prolific serial killer to hit Louisiana since the early 30s,” the anchor droned on, but his words were like white noise in your ears.

You’re so screwed, this is what you get for sloppy work. Next time you won’t waste time feeling bad; from now on, if you stab someone, you’re going to finish the job and make eye contact the whole damn time if necessary. This is terrible.

“Wow, that’s terrible,” you’re unknowingly mimicked by the waiter, while he leans to clean the booth in front of yours. “What kind of chick kills, like, fifty people so brutally? Glad the poor guy was lucky enough to survive that monster.”

“Yeah,” you say, mouth dry, “how lucky.” You pay for your meal and head out, mind spinning.

The cops have you pinpointed to this city. You can’t stay, but you don’t know where else to go. This isn’t sustainable, and sooner or later, your crimes are going to catch up with you. As you stroll aimlessly, you catch sight of the father-daughter pair down the street and pause.

If you’re going to get caught eventually, probably sooner rather than later, you want to see your dad at least once before then. You never wanted to involve him in this, but you’re selfish and now that everything is coming to a head, you don’t have the heart to stay away from home any longer. You turn and head towards the nearest bus stop. It’s only a two-day trip home.

* * *

You’ve been walking for roughly an hour. Buses don’t go all the way out to your homestead and hitchhiking would probably get you recognized by the locals who’ve known you all your life. This is meant to be an in and out goodbye. You’ll reunite with your dad, tell him what happened to you and what you’ve done and face his judgment. If he doesn’t turn you in, you’ll get closure, then leave. It’s a simple plan, but still, you can’t bring yourself to turn that last corner that will lead up to your house.

After pacing for nearly half an hour, you finally steel yourself. It’s late afternoon, your father will definitely be home. Better to get this over with, like ripping off a band-aid. You force yourself to go around the bend (in a literal sense, though likely long since the metaphorical one as well) and up to the front porch. One moment’s more hesitation is all you allow yourself before you suck it up and knock, shave-and-a-haircut style, as you’ve always done.

There’s shuffling inside as someone approaches the door. It swings open, revealing your father, scruffy and bedraggled with obvious sleeplessness.

“Hi, dad,” you rasp, overcome with emotion. He’s silent for a a second that feel more like an eternity. That must be the time it takes for him to work out who’s in front of him, because then he’s swooping you up into his arms in a bear hug. You find you’re too busy sobbing into his chest for your hands to even twitch towards your knife.

* * *

That night, as you ate a home-cooked meal for the first time in two years, you found yourself warmed in a way you had missed for long long you’d forgotten to miss it. So far, your dad had listened to you as you babbled out everything that had happened to you since you’d been taken so long ago. Tears in your eyes, you had confessed in gory detail your every crime.

But when you finished speaking, he’d only gripped your shoulders, looked deep into your eyes and said, “Honey, I’d lost you. I’ve lost your mother and then I thought I lost you, too. But you’re back now. That’s all that matters.”

“But what about all the people I killed,” you sniffled.

“Honey, I’m sorry but I just don’t give a damn. You could’ve killed half the town for all I care, as long as you’re here it’ll be alright.”

That was a few hours ago and now that the emotional roller-coaster of your homecoming was over, you felt it was time to bring up an unwelcome topic- the fact that you had to leave. The problem was, every time you mentioned it, your dad only glared you into silence or pretended he hadn’t heard you.

“Listen, dad,” you try again, “If I stay, the police will definitely find me. And then they’ll come and find you.” Your father was unphased.

“That’s too bad,” he said, “Because then they’d have to find the business end of my shotgun.” And he kept on eating dinner as if the last minute hadn’t happened. You sigh and decide to bring it up again in the morning. You couldn’t bear to break your dad’s heart right now.

* * *

It’s been almost a week and you’re crawling out of your skin. You’ve missed home with all your heart, but staying in one place for more than a couple days is making you twitchy and paranoid. More so than usual, that is. Your dad pretends that it’s all fine, but you’ve noticed how he knocks at doorways ever since you nearly flipped off the back of the couch at his sudden entry.

Family meals are in the living room, now. All the better to catch the news on your small tv, paying close attention to the crime segment, just in case. So far, nothing has been said, both on the news or between you and your dad on the topic of your impeding arrest. It’s simple cause in effect; if you stop running, the people chasing you will eventually catch up. Still, the subject has stayed as the elephant in the room, though not for your lack of trying. For all his griping at the stubbornness you’d supposedly inherited from your mom, he could out-stubborn a bull.

If only you could settle in and enjoy these last few days with your loving father, who’d clearly gone out of his mind with stress while you were gone, but you found yourself jumping at shadows and small sounds. The day before, your father convinced you to go hunting with him, just like old times.

Your senses honed by years on the run, letting your ears catch the footfalls of even the smallest animal, you managed to take down five jackrabbits alone, a personal record. You also blew holes into several unsuspecting trees, but to save face to your dad, you pretend those were just to let off steam. As proud as he was of your haul, it’s just one more reminder that things had changed. You no longer belonged in this cozy little burrow your family had carved for itself as shelter against the world. You weren’t a hunter right now, you were prey, fight-or-flight triggered so hard it ached. Every bone in your body begged to give into it and take flight. Unfortunately, your father had fallen hard on the ‘fight’ side of the spectrum and refused to see reason.

That night, the other shoe finally dropped. You were cooking up some of the meat from your last hunt when your dad entered the kitchen unannounced.

“Yum! That looks delicious, hun,” he said, popping up over your shoulder. You shrieked, did what you’ve always done when surprised these days; you stabbed him.

There’s a moment’s pause, as both of you look down at the blade embedded about an inch deep into your father’s bicep. You scream again and drop the knife.

“Oh my god! Dad are you okay, I’m so sorry,” you rush out in total panic. Your hands flutter uselessly in his direction as he winces and goes to the sink.

“It’s alright, honey, I shouldn’t’ve surprised you, is all,” he waves away through gritted teeth.

You watch in fretful silence as he cleans the wound, only stepping close to help him wrap it. An hour later, you’ve finished up dinner in silence and helped your dad to the dining room. He clears his throat awkwardly as you eat.

“I’m not mad,” he starts, but you cut him off.

“That ain’t the issue here, pops. I hurt you, bad, and if there’s a next time, we both know it’ll be worse.”

He disagrees, saying it was only a little cut, but you’re unmoved, and this is an argument you won’t budge on.

“It’s only luck that has you here, alive and mostly whole. The longer I stay, the worse you’ll be hurt.” Your words are quiet, reluctant, but steady and sure nonetheless. “And you don’t wanna talk about it, but I can’t stay anyways. If I go into town, the folks there will turn me in. That police sketch is everywhere. And if I stay locked up, you’re the only one around to get hurt, and the cops’ll come and take me anyways.”

A hard look enters your father’s eyes. He’s always been the immovable object in the face of you and your mothers unstoppable force.

“Those cops’ll be taking you over my dead body.”

He’s serious, and you know with a terrible certainty that his words aren’t a threat; they’re a prediction. You let the subject drop, knowing that it’s pointless to try and convince him otherwise. You finish the meal, the mournful croon of those scratchy old records a static-y backdrop to your troubled thoughts. In the end, you tell your dad goodnight, hug him carefully, but hard, and head into your room. You pack only what you can carry.

* * *

You decide you’ll leave a note this time. Your poor, undyingly loyal father deserved as much. You could’ve sworn your heart ripped in two as you looked down at the form of your injured dad. Something tells you it’s the last time you’ll see him. You leave seconds later. Most of you is numb in a way that you haven’t felt since your first kill, but more than anything, you find yourself filled with a grim determination. You pace the once familiar path to town. It’s night, and the only people out are those who know better than to get up in others’ business, so you figure it’s safe enough.

You’ve just passed the old run-down bar near the outskirts, paying no mind to the old drunkard on its steps. You keep walking, one boot in front of the other and humming one of those jazzy songs that’ve been ingrained deep into your memory by now. You won’t risk hitchhiking this close to your dad’s place, so it’ll be a long walk to the next town over. You’re so deep in thought, you never notice the old man staggering behind you at a distance, slowly gaining.

You’ve never been a good singer, your voice too raspy by every measure. But with the moon casting deep shadows across the woods lining the endless highway road, you feel compelled to give some kind of meaningful farewell to what you’re leaving behind you.

“ _Sunday is gloomy, my hours are slumberless. Dearest, the shadows I live with are numberless. Little white flowers will never awaken you. Not where the black coach of sorrow has taken you._ ” If you sang loud enough, you could almost hear the phantom sounds of brass instruments on the wind.

“ _Angels have no thought of ever returning you. Would they be angry if I thought of joining you? Gloomy Sunday_ ,” your voice echoed eerily down the highway, and you hoped the static that filled your thoughts would have the decency to fill your heart as well.

“ _Gloomy is Sunday, with shadows I spend it all. My heart and I have decided to end it all. Soon there'll be candles and prayers that are sad, I know. Let them not weep, let them know that I'm glad to go._ ”

You spun you knife to the tune of the invisible jazz band and let your wavering voice rise to meet the crescendo only you could hear. Your mournful rasp would have sent shivers down the spine of anyone who heard. The man behind you felt deep unease as he lumbered along in your wake.

" _Death is no dream, for in death I'm caressing you. With the last breath of my soul I'll be blessing you. Gloomy Sunday_ ," you finished, and this time as you twirled your blade, it caught the light of moon.

The sight of it pulled a gasp from the old drunk, and you whirled around, pulled from your reverie. When he notices you’ve caught on to him, he straightens up best he can and shoots a look of pure disdain towards you. You tense up, on your guard.

“So,” he drawls, “it’s you, then, is it? The Highway Butcher turned out ta be lil miss Lockwood from down the road. Who’da thunk?” He sneered at you as he swayed, unsteady. The strong smell of cheap booze wafting off of him made you curl your lip in disgust.

“What’s it to you?” You don’t deny it. You’ve left a witness alive before. You won’t make the same mistake twice. The nonchalant answer seems to enrage him.

“What’s it to me?!” he screams, spittle flying. “You killed my boy, you bitch! My son, off to college and found dead in a ditch by the side of a road. Ripped to pieces, they said! Butchered! My son was a good man!”

“Your son was a creep and a coward,” you snarl back. The man gives a guttural scream of rage, but doesn’t charge at you like you’d hoped. He’s eyeing your knife warily, but he's not sober enough to do the smart thing and run. Tired of the theatrics, you approach him with purpose. Best to get this over with and get some distance between you and this damn town.

The man backs up a few steps, stumbling, but not running. Good, you don’t feel up to a chase right now. You rush him on autopilot, letting your subconscious take over and target vital points. By now it’s muscle memory that has you sinking your knife deep into his chest cavity, between the ribs.

Your tunnel vision costs you. You never see the glint of silver at his side, only the flash of a muzzle aimed at your chest. You gasp, ears ringing, and stumble back. The man is groaning on the floor, a smoking pistol at his side. His wound is fatal, but you can’t focus on that. You feel cold, and when you raise a hand to your chest, it comes away wet with blood. You’re in shock, you think, but you were already so numb before that it’s hard to tell. You can only manage to stumble into the woods before you collapse.

Coughing wetly, you dimly realize the bullet must have pierced your lung. There’s nothing you can do for an injury like that. The old bastard’s not long for this world, but he’s gotten his fair due outta you. You drag yourself into the underbrush and hope that the wildlife find your body before the cops do. The foxes would actually get some use out of you, you think, somewhat hysterically. You don’t feel the pain, yet. You don’t feel anything at all, though your limbs tremble with exertion and blood loss.

Feeling cold, you curl up in within the shelter of the bush, wrapped around your knife like a teddy bear, and gasp for breath. Your eyes close without permission, and you’re shivering and struggling to take in air past the blood filling your lungs. You’re too numb to feel afraid of what comes next.

It’s 1997, you are nineteen years old, and you’ve killed forty-nine people, counting yourself, because really you have only yourself to blame. You are suffocating to death in the cold woods, body left for the predators that roam the night. It’s a fitting end, you think, as the lack of oxygen finally grants you the mercy of unconsciousness. You don’t live long enough to dream.

* * *

You wake up surrounded by red. Screams fill the air and smoke is rising over a distant skyline. Sitting up, you look around yourself and see that you’ve appeared in the mouth of a wide alleyway. Down the street are what you can only describe as demons, running for cover for some reason, shoving each other as they try to force their way into the shops. You lay back down, overcome.

This can only be one place. You’ve died and literally gone to Hell. You take a deep steadying breath and let it out. A single thought occupies the whole of your mind. This is such _**bullshit!**_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, Alastor and company are coming in next chapter, since this one was getting pretty long already. So stay tuned, folks!
> 
> For those interested, the song is "Gloomy Sunday" by Artie Shaw, also known as 'The Hungarian Death Song'. Link is here: https://youtu.be/Oh-m5z0gMPw
> 
> (Note: This story is currently cross-posted on Wattpad)


	2. Welcome to Hell (Would Ya Like a Hand?)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So you've damned yourself to Hell. Now what? It turns out that the afterlife isn't all that different from normal life, except stabbing people is significantly less of a problem. Maybe your new boss disagrees, but she'll have to excuse you because you're pretty distracted by the dapper gentleman in the parlor. He's a serial killer? Great, you have something in common!
> 
> Meanwhile, Alastor can't quite figure out this charming little demon who jumps at shadows but won't blink twice at actual conflict.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a bit to get out, have a longer than usual chapter as tribute! More info in the End Notes

The first thing you do after your internal tantrum ends is sit up. Unfortunately, your head is suddenly more top-heavy than usual, which is disorienting enough that you nearly fall back down again. Your eyebrow twitches at whatever fresh bullshit is happening now, and you feel something twitch atop your skull with it. Ears? You look into a nearby puddle of unknown liquid and see your distorted face looking back.

Your hair is short and curly, and it’s burgundy now, as are the massive bunny ears you’re now sporting. On closer inspection, they’re actually jackrabbit ears, and the distinction makes you feel better. Beyond that, your eyes were now red and your teeth sharp and needle-like. You rounded off your shocked inspection by noting that your skin was a soft shade of taupe. Reeling at the changes, but mostly just aggravated, you finally move your attention to the screams and distant explosions happening outside the alley.

Well, if this is hell, you might as well embrace damnation and go see what the fuss is about. Getting to your feet, you move to the mouth of the alley, but are interrupted by a hissing voice.

“Psst! Kid!”

You turn around to see a bear of a man calling out to you. Quite literally a bear, from what little of him you could see not crouched behind a dumpster. You decide to ignore him and turn away.

“Hey!” he calls out in a weird sort of shouty-whisper. “Get back here, are you crazy?”

With a huff you whip around a third time and head towards him. He motions you to crouch down behind the dumpster with him and for lack of anything better to do, you comply.

“What do you want?’

“I want to know what the hell you’re doing! Are you trying to get us killed?” he cries. You’re silent in your confusion, not sure what it is you did that was so dangerous. Instead of answering, you observe the weird stranger. His features are blocky, and his ears and nose are clearly based off a bear’s, but the long dreads he has tied back lend him a human touch. His skin and eyes are both pitch black, as are his clothes, except where the dust and grime of the alley have clearly stained them. He picks up on your confusion and sighs.

“Look, you’re new right? Don’t answer that, I saw you manifest. Point is, now was a really shitty time to die, so you best hunker down for tonight before you start wandering around like a moron.”

Offended and even more confused than before, you start to stand.

“Thanks for the advice,” you say with as much insincerity as you can muster, “but I think I’m gonna go and wander around like a moron now.”

His panicked expression gives you pause ( _ha, paws_ ) as he grips your wrist. You notice absently that your own hands are changed now, fingers a bit stockier, like a hare’s, and you have small but sharp claws on the end.

“Listen, you can go out there and be another hunk of meat for the Exterminators to tear into another day, but right now, if you leave this alley, you’ll lead ‘em right to _me_. So sit down and be quiet before you kill us both, little bunny.”

His voice trembles with terror as well as a surprising ferocity and you find yourself sitting back down behind the shelter of the dumpster.

“I’m pretty sure I’m a jackrabbit, actually. Not a a rabbit,” you sulk, not ready to give up the last word. One of them is significantly less fluffy and fragile than the other and suddenly the difference has become much more personal. The bear-man laughs quietly, looking relieved that you weren’t about to rush out of the alley out of spite.

“I’m sure you are, little bunny. Tell ya what, hunker down with me all silent-like for a few hours and I’ll let you educate me on the difference.”

He’s clearly humoring you, but for the first demon you’ve met, you guess you could’ve done worse. You just huff and settle in, ignoring the way the nasty dumpster fluid was seeping into your clothes.

“The name’s Artie, by the way, since I might’ve forgot to mention.” He holds a massive clawed hand for you to shake. You’ve decided you like Artie and you take his massive paw and shake it without hesitation.

“I’m Honey,” you introduce yourself, and he’s clearly struggling not to laugh. You’re annoyed until you get the connection between bears and honey, and yeah okay, that’s pretty funny.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up big guy,” you say. He chuckles briefly but keeps it down, likely to keep whatever those ‘Exterminators’ were from hearing. You’d have to be pretty loud to be heard over the general chaos happening outside the alley, but better safe than sorry, you guess.

“That’s one hell of a coincidence, little bunny,” he says, ignoring your scowl. “Say, how’d a little thing like you end up down here. If you’re as twitchy and flighty as your form suggests, shouldn’t you be hopping around up top?” he’s clearly just curious, but the implication that you resemble prey grates on you. It’s upsetting, but you decide not to give into the outrage you’re feeling.

“I was a serial killer, actually,” you say a second later, absolutely giving into your outrage, and the shock on his face spurs you on.

“I had a pretty high body count going and the cops were on my trail, so I went to my Pop’s for a final farewell. Trouble is, the old man of some guy I killed got the jump on me. At least I took the bastard down with me,” you finished, tone as vicious as it was bittersweet. It feels liberating, in a way, to put everything out there like that. There’s a long pause while Artie looks down at you, but then he shakes his head and grins widely.

“Damn, kid, I wasn’t expecting that! Don’t serial killers have an m.o. or something? How’d you even find that many specific people to knock off?”

“Well, pretty much all of them were an accident,” you admit, blushing, to his disbelief. The two of you chat for hours as the sounds of violence slowly peter out. Only once did you have to fall silent; a shadow had fallen down the length of the alley and lingered, before what looked like a bloodied mechanical angel moved on with stilted, glitchy motions.

Finally Artie got up and stretched, towering over you. “Looks like the coast is clear, little bunny. Doesn’t get safer than this,” he said, helping you up.

There was still the occasional scream in the distance, but you figured that probably wasn’t uncommon in Hell. You follow behind Artie, unsure of what to do now.

“So I guess now we part ways, huh?”

He looks back at you in confusion. “What gave you that idea? We’re friends aren’t we, little bunny-”

“I’m a jackrabbit,” you interrupt again, but he waves you off.

“Yes, that. So seeing as you’re fresh off the funeral boat, I’ll do you a solid and help you get on your feet.”

Your dad always told you not to look a gift horse in the mouth, but you’ve always taken after your mother more. You can almost hear her voice saying, “Nothing in life is free, child. Anyone tell you otherwise, you’re what they’re sellin’.” Suspicion wars with your tentative trust in your new friend. You ask why he’s bothering to stick his neck out for you, not sure what to expect.

Artie just grins at you in response as you stroll down the street, dodging rubble and avoiding corpses. “Tell you the truth, kid, it’s a matter of me paying it forward. When I first woke up down here a few years back, some lady took me in, helped me get settled.”

He shrugs and then admits, “Turns out she was just luring me into a false sense of security so she could knock me out and sell my organs, but it’s the principle of it don’t you think?”

You let out a surprised laugh and nod. You’re wary still, of course, but as long as you don’t think too hard on the circumstances of your life and death, you think you might come to like it here in Hell.

* * *

Years pass by in a blur. For all that it’s full of violence and bloodshed, Hell isn’t so bad compared to the fast-paced anxious scramble of your last few years alive. You might even call it boring, now that you’ve settled in. Without needing to worry about the consequences of an occasional stabbing or two, your jittery nerves have actually served you well, since you use your “winnings” for pocket change. Besides Artie having helped set you up with a cozy little apartment, you’ve gotten a job at a cafe that you enjoy.

You can’t say you never thought about being a cook when you were alive, but you’d accepted it as an impossibility after you’d found yourself on the wrong end of the law. Now, everything was looking up.

You walked into the cafe, a charming little place with a misleadingly shitty exterior. If you were honest with yourself, the inside looked like crap, too. All the chairs were mismatched and the paint was peeling off the walls. But you were a sucker for a place with a warm atmosphere and good food.

“Heya, Honey,” greeted the cashier. “Boss wanted to speak wit’chu bout something. Sounded important.”

You nodded and made your way to the back, thankful that you’d made it to work before opening so that you didn’t have to sidestep any customers. A quick visit to your boss’ office later revealed he’d only wanted to remind you weren’t being paid for overtime, so could you please give it a rest with the experimental midnight cooking. You thanked him for the reminder and blatantly refused to stop. Thankfully, he was just amused and waved you off to the kitchens.

It was a long and difficult day at work, like every other day. You were the only cook there, since anyone else in the kitchen with you tended to meet the sharp end of your knife eventually, to everyone’s dismay. You didn’t mind, though, you found it fun and rewarding in a way, even though nearly all the ingredients in Hell were off-brand knockoffs and sub-ideal to work with. You really needed to set some time aside to hunt some fresh meat. Hell wasn’t lacking in wildlife if you knew where to look.

You considered potential places to hunt as you hung up your apron and clocked out, leaving the kitchen. All the regulars still there made sure to stay very still as you passed. You’ve worked here for the better part of a decade, and the ones smart enough not to startle you were the ones who stayed intact long enough to enjoy your cooking. From a distance of course.

As you walked home, you took a moment to appreciate your boss for not having fired you a hundred times over. Accidental stabbings weren’t great for business, even in Hell. But when you’d mustered up the guts to ask him about it once, he’d admitted that you were “a damn good cook”. He also said that no one else really wants to work in this part of of town, ‘cause it sucks and gets more and more damaged with each consecutive extermination. He only made you put up a sign above the kitchen door, which read “Knock Before Entering”. You loved that sign. Everyone was happier and less bloody because of that sign.

You open the door to your apartment with a sigh. You set up your record player before heading to the kitchen. Today called for a hot chocolate. Once it’s ready, you kick back on the couch and sip at your drink, eyes closed. Sat comfortably in a decent apartment, surrounding by warmth and good music, you smile wryly and toast to your job security.

* * *

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

You’re looking out at the city from your balcony. The streets are in chaos, explosions and screams filling the air, so thick with dust that it was hard to breathe. This had to be the worst extermination since you woke up in Hell roughly a decade ago.

Deciding to hunker down in your bedroom with your knife, you find yourself shaking in stress. From the relative safety of your closet, you send a text to Artie to check if he’s alright. It’s still weird for you how small and useful cellphones have gotten. You’re not complaining, but you can’t deny you’re a little bitter over dying before you could experience twenty-first century technology at its finest. If this was Hell’s cheap knockoff stuff, you can only imagine the reception topside.

Artie thankfully texted you back, likewise hiding in his place. You sent an obligatory text asking why he didn’t find a comfortable and secure dumpster instead, but your heart wasn’t in it. You couldn’t help but feel worried over the cafe. It’d barely weathered the past few exterminations and sooner or later it’d bite the dust from the fallout.

The next day, you stood in front of the rubble that used to be your dream job. Just this once, you were pissed at being proved right. You climb over the remains towards the kitchen, stepping over a heavy chunk of debris with an arm that looked suspiciously like your boss’ sticking out from below. Poor bastard must have stayed late and paid the price.

As you stand in the completely demolished kitchen, something catches your eye. It’s your sign, the one which had marked the kitchen as your own little safe slice of home. You pick it up and take it with you as you wander away. You have no idea what to do now. You’ve got some cash saved up, but not enough for more than a month or so of rent. And while exterminations tended to stimulate the job market and all, since all the shops were scrambling to replace employees, you didn’t have the first clue where to look.

You still had time before it became an issue, so you decided to walk for a bit and ask around at any restaurants that are still standing. Hopefully they were hiring.

* * *

You have decided that job searching sucks. In fact, you've decided you'd rather just die, starving and broke, and spare yourself the headache of putting up with annoying and twitchy managers. Everyone was still jittery from the whole murder spree yesterday, which would be fine, except their jerky movements kept setting you off. So what if you stabbed them a couple times? Suck it up, buttercup, your _old_ boss never minded much. But no, apparently minor flesh wounds were a deal breaker for these people, and you were turned away every time.

Groaning in frustration, your ears fell back against your head and you barely managed to keep from screaming at the sky like a maniac. You were starting to think you should have waited until things had settled down before you went around into crowded spaces. Fed up with being rejected to your face, you snatch an armful of newspapers off a half-destroyed cart and head home. Job hunting via newspaper ads seems like a good alternative. You’d rather be rejected over the phone.

Hours later and the sky was starting to dim outside your apartment. So far you’d gone through all the papers and been rejected from every promising opening. Apparently, the nicer establishments had mostly gotten through the extermination with their employees intact and only wanted waiters or busboys. You felt above washing dishes for a living, but you were desperate, so you’d gone over everything a second time with lower standards, to no avail.

In a fit of rage, you fling the papers off the table and scream into your hands. Once you’ve calmed down, you reluctantly bend down to pick up the mess. As you do, an ad catches your eye. It was brightly colored and had been slipped into the last pages of the paper. You have no idea how you missed it before. It read “Happy Hotel: The Hotel That Rehabilitates Sinners. Now Hiring!” as well as a list of open positions.

That seemed like kind of a weird business to run in Hell, but frankly you didn’t care if you were cooking food for a troop of Executioners as long as you got paid a decent amount. You cross your fingers and call the number. It rings for a long time and just as you’re considering hanging up the receiver clicks and you hear air whoosh on the other line, like somebody slammed the phone onto their ear.

“This is the Happy Hotel, howmaywebeofservicetoday!” a voice chatters at full speed and volume, and you nearly drop your phone in surprise.

“Um.” you say. “I’m calling to ask about your help wanted ad. Do you still have an opening for a chef position?” There’s a high pitched squeal on their end, making you wince and flick your ears back.

“Vaggie, oh my gosh, get over here!” you hear distantly, and the phone passes hands. A new voice speaks up, thankfully at less of an ear shattering volume.

“Hi, this is Vaggie. I’m the hotel manager. Who is this and why are you calling again?”

“Oh, sorry, yeah. I’m Honey and I wanted to apply for a position in your kitchen.”

There’s a pause before she responds, confusion evident in her tone. “Wait, really? Why?”

Now you’re confused. Is this a test? A weird question to weed out applicants? You try for the right answer.

“I, uh, need money.” Nailed it.

“No yeah, I get that,” answers Vaggie, mild annoyance in her voice, “But if you’re sure about applying here I’ll need to ask a few questions first.”

Finally, the interview portion of the call, where things made sense. After a ridiculously long series of questions from a strangely suspicious interviewer– which ranged from your opinion on redemption (you were neutral) to your ability to handle “fucking annoying spiders” (very high, you were a country girl, after all) and only barely on your prior kitchen experience– you were done.

“Alright, so you seem to check out,” Vaggie reluctantly allows. “The job includes room and board, so bring your things by anytime in the next day and we’ll set up your room. As head chef, and technically the only chef, the starting pay is pretty high but we can negotiate in person.”

Wait what? You have so many questions but thankfully the most important one is what comes out.

“How high are we talking here?”

The sheer figures in her answer send your head spinning and your mouth starts moving without your permission, southern accent thicker from your surprise. “How the hell am _I_ the head chef if you’re shellin’ out that much cash? Shouldn’t you have half of Pentagram City fighting for this position?”

“You were the only applicant, and we’re hungry,” she grits out in response. Oh. Fair enough.

You thank Vaggie for the job and hang up, still not entirely sure what had just happened. Because you could’ve sworn you just scored a high paying job as a chef, are being given a new place, rent-free, and the only catch is that the hotel you work at has a crappy reputation. You couldn’t give less of a shit about that, so you let out a disbelieving laugh and decide to call up Artie to brag about your fantastic job scoring skills.

“Hey, Artie, have I got some news for you!” you crow into your phone. “What? Your place got wrecked? That’s cool, you can have mine.”

“Yes, I’m serious; I’m moving out. Help me move my shit over and we’ll call it square.”

As soon as you hang up, you start packing. You also change into the nicer variation of your usual outfit, a black button up and burgundy skirt, paired with red suspenders and black knee socks and your favorite dark red ankle boots. You want to dress to impress for your new job, even if that means wearing your fancy clothes. Of course, your regular clothes are almost exactly the same, but it’s the thought that counts. It seems like things are looking up for once.

* * *

Giddy with excitement, you watch as Artie drops the last of your bags off in the hotel lobby. He waves off your thanks and heads out, leaving you to focus back on Charlie and Vaggie, who were going over the requirements of your position. As far as you could tell, given that Charlie was too excited for you to follow along, and Vaggie was too busy mooning over her apparent girlfriend to go into detail, your job was actually pretty simple.

It basically boiled down to: _feed everyone, please, we don’t care what it is, just make it more edible than the takeout down the street, we’ll cover all the ingredients if you’ll just make good food_. At least, that’s the general vibe you were getting here. As Charlie– who you still couldn’t believe was _the_ Princess of Hell, she was so nice– finished cheerfully describing all the perks to working here, you were finally left to get settled in.

By the time you finished unpacking in what turned out to be a sizable suite, it was late enough to start work on dinner. With your new budget being what it was, you felt no guilt in heading out and buying what felt like half the meat and groceries in the city. You were sparing no expense, but still, it was kind of frustrating that none of the meat in the city was fresh enough for your tastes.

Regardless, it’s late afternoon when you get to stocking your new kitchen. Familiarizing yourself with all the equipment takes a bit, but you find yourself feeling comfortable in the large clean space. You start filling cabinets with your own cooking implements but it’s not until you hang up your little “Knock Before Entering” sign that the space really feels yours.

“What to make, what to make,” you wonder to yourself as you look at your cold storage room. You’ve definitely gone a bit overboard there, to the point where every rack is packed from floor to ceiling. Filled with the housewarming spirit, you decide to go with a taste of home and pull out some venison. In your opinion, nothing beats some good old deer meat.

You crank up some jazz music on your phone and get to work, chopping meat and potatoes as you sway to the beat. Humming to yourself, you barely notice the hours pass by, and you’re trying to finish up a shrimp jambalaya alongside your mother’s old venison steak recipe. It wasn’t hers originally, she’d apparently gotten it from an old friend that she refused to name, presumably so that you wouldn’t go harass them for recipes, but it’d been decades since you’d last made it. Your memory of it is fuzzy at best, and your intense concentration and loud music kept you from noticing anything happening outside your kitchen.

The sounds of the massive front doors opening and the discussion slowly turning into an argument in the parlor were blocked out entirely. The sound of the kitchen door creaking open and the low snuffling and pattering of hooves behind you would’ve been equally disregarded if not for the wet press of a nose against your leg. You jumped straight into the air with a squeak and fling your arm out to slash.

Thankfully, the thing behind you was too small to be stabbed. You look down and are faced with the smallest, most adorable pig you’ve ever seen. It’s pink with small lavender splotches all over and squeals back at you cutely. You are overcome with the need to pet it. You refuse to repress the urge and immediately scritch at its ears. The little snort it makes nearly makes you cry.

Still, you’re kind of in chef mode at the moment; your knife is in hand, you’re desperate for fresh meat, and a very chunky and delicious looking pig is right there. You lift the knife, but pause, realizing how out of place it is for a pig to show up in a hotel. Maybe it was someone’s pet?

“Hey, has anyone seen Fat Nuggets? Fat Nuggets, c’mere sweetums!” croons an unfamiliar male voice.

Looking closer, you spot a collar around the pig. The tag reads Fat Nuggets. You don’t have time to process that before a weirdly sexy spider demon busts through the kitchen door. You assume this was that Angel Dust guy that Vaggie had mentioned earlier.

“Hey, newbie, you seen a pig aroun- Oh my god _what are you doing to Fat Nuggets?!_ ” he screams.

In his defense, you were crouched over his pet, knife raised and apron covered in blood from the venison earlier. That still didn’t stop you from reacting instinctively to someone busting into your space and screaming, so before you know it your knife is already deeply embedded in his shoulder. There’s a pause.

“Did you just _STAB ME?!_ ” he demands. Before either of you can react further, the pig, clearly startled by all the yelling, oinks in distress and skitters out of the kitchen at full speed. The spider guy un-stabs himself by stepping back and runs after his pet.

“Nuggets, come here sweetie, what did she do to you?” he cries dramatically. Seeing as all you ended up doing was give the pig a damn ear scratch, you’re offended at his insinuation. You feel righteous indignation selling up, compelling you to defend your honor.

“I didn’t do anything!” you yell, following behind.

“You stabbed me!” Angel screeches, “And you tried to eat my pig!”

The pig in question is booking it into the parlor, skidding on the wood floors as he turns the corner.

“Well, maybe if you’d knocked, I wouldn’t’ve stabbed you! There was a sign, you know!” you shoot back. “And I wasn’t trying to _eat_ it, but maybe you should think twice about letting your walking pork-chop into people’s kitchens!”

He only screams back at you in frustration as the pig runs behind someone’s legs. It’s only now that you realize you have an audience. Charlie and Vaggie are looking at you in stunned silence, and the third person, who is bending down to pick up Fat Nuggets, stops you in your tracks.

The man is dressed in a dapper red pinstripe suit, with black accents. He seems to be some sort of deer demon, going by the antlers and distressingly soft-looking ears. He grins a maw full of sharp teeth at the pig, who has stopped squirming and appears to be frozen in fear. You can’t see why it would; he has a lovely smile.

“What a charming pet,” he says, and wait, is his voice crackling with static? That’s neat. Vaggie glares at the demon, who ignores her as he passes the animal to Angel, who has also gone deathly still for some reason. He reaches out and hugs the pig, who snuffles happily into his fluffy chest. The “fucking annoying spider” skitters back out of immediate reach of the newcomer before using his lower arms to examine every inch of his squirming pet.

“Poor baby, did the mean chef hurt you? How’s my little Fat Nugget?” Angel fusses. Your audience instantly forgotten in a fresh wave of annoyance, you turn to your soon-to-be repeat stab victim.

“I said I didn’t hurt the damn pig, give it a rest already.”

“Yeah, like I’ll buy that,” he snarks back, clutching the pig even tighter. “You stabbed me in the shoulder!”

Fed up and suddenly understanding Vaggie’s previous half hour rant on the Hotel’s first patient, you snap at him. “You have at least three more of those, so quit whining. And stay out of my kitchen!”

With a huff, he turns on his heel and leaves. Seething, you turn and then promptly flush in embarrassment. Charlie and Vaggie are still staring at you, while the stranger just smiles at you with an eyebrow raised in curiosity. Man, what a way to start your first day on the job.

“Sorry about that,” you apologize to your boss (bosses? You can’t figure out if you work for Vaggie or Charlie, or both).

“It was unprofessional of me to yell.” You deliberately avoid apologizing for the stabbing. You’re not sorry about that at all right now.

Vaggie opens her mouth to respond, but is cut off by the deer demon as he steps forward.

“I hardly see why a young lady defending herself would be worthy of apology. The name’s Alastor, dear, and I have to say, that was quite the spectacle just now! I assume you’re the new chef?” he asks boisterously, stepping into your space and extending a hand. Your hand twitches out of both instinct and habit at the sudden movement, ready to summon your knife. Judging by the way his grin stretches, Alastor clearly noticed.

You take his hand anyways. “You assume correctly. My name’s Honey,” you say. "It’s a pleasure to meet you," you then add, because your mother raised you to be a proper southern lady.

He blinks, as though you’ve surprised him, then somehow smiles wider. Instead of shaking your hand, he swoops in dramatically to kiss your knuckles and you feel your face heat up in a blush. Dapper gentlemen– your only weakness. It doesn't help that his fluffy ears are now much closer to your face. Your fingers twitch again as you restrain yourself from assaulting the man with pets. The urge fades somewhat as he straightens and pulls away to respond.

“Likewise, my dear. It’s a rare treat to see such manners in so young a demon,” he tells you, and the permanent undercurrent of static in his voice is light and airy.

Suddenly Vaggie cuts in, apparently having recovered from her surprise. “What the hell is happening right now?”

You open your mouth to answer but she cuts you off. “You know what, I don’t care. Alastor, you were just leaving, right?” she grits out, staring him down. He looks at her implacably, his expression fixed and suddenly his smile looks a lot less friendly.

“Was I?” he asks neutrally, but the atmosphere turns heavy. You feel as though the shadows in the room are growing longer, and a faint crackling can be heard, as though someone was turning up the volume on a vintage radio. You think you can see faded symbols floating in and out of your peripheral vision, which is restricted as a stifling darkness starts to press in on your senses. You don’t really know what to do about any of that, so you just ignore it and turn to face Alastor.

You pause briefly, seeing the way his form seems to flicker, showing hints of something truly demonic. The sight flicks every mental switch that should have you on high alert, and there’s no denying the innate sense of predator coming off him in waves. But you stopped being prey yourself decades ago, and while you felt the prickling discomfort of facing a threat, something about the rising sound static reminded you of your mom’s crackly old records and your father’s own refusal to just replace his grandfather’s slowly failing radio and the association is messing with your instincts.

Then you notice how his hair is very subtly floofier from the presumed static and you lose your entire fucking mind. In an effort to keep things from escalating, you clear your throat. Alastor blinks and turns to face you, eyes dark and smile bloody. He tilts his head at you in question, and you feel the responsibility of preventing an all out brawl settle heavy on your shoulders. You search for something to say.

“Dinner should be done in a few minutes if you’d like to stay for it,” your traitorous mouth offers. Vaggie glares at you and Charlie is just biting her nails and looking back and forth between everyone. You find that despite your internal screaming, you can’t really regret pissing off your boss, seeing as the weird activity dies down almost instantly. Alastor blinks once before resuming his cheerful demeanor.

“Certainly, sweetheart, though I’d hate to impose!” Despite his words, he’s already moving further into the house, to Vaggie’s clear distaste.

“Full disclosure,” you say, walking with him. “Tonight’s meal is venison. I hope that’s not a problem, given that, you know,” you say, gesturing towards his antlers. To your surprise he shakes his head and the crackling picks up in pitch as he laughs.

"Quite the opposite, dear. I'm rather fond of venison, though I prefer it somewhat under-cooked,” he says.

“Of course you do, you fucking cannibal,” mutters Vaggie from behind you, but Alastor walks on as though he didn’t hear her. Once you all reach the dining room, you excuse yourself to the kitchen so you could serve up dinner while Charlie leaves to round up the rest of the Hotel’s inhabitants.

You don’t stop to ask yourself if leaving Vaggie and Alastor alone is a bad idea. Your mind is focused on serving a meal good enough to keep Vaggie from firing you for being so much trouble on your first day.

* * *

By the time you start bringing out the food with the help of Charlie’s delightful little goat servants, just about everyone is seated in the dining room. There are a few people you don’t recognize, like the cat with wings who seems painfully hungover, and a cute little cyclops demon who jitters in place as she chats with Angel Dust. The spider in question shoots you a nasty glare as you enter, but you ignore him for now.

“Ooh, who’s this?” asks the dainty cyclops, whose voice is pitched cutely if not a bit shrill.

“Who cares?” mutters the cat demon as he takes a swig from a bottle you swore hadn’t been there a second ago.

Charlie jumps on the chance to introduce you to everyone, and you smile and nod as you begin serving the dishes. You make idle chit chat as you serve dinner and find yourself genuinely charmed by Nifty, who was a sweet little chatterbox, and amused by Husk, who bristled at your attempts at small talk and was crassly defensive in the face of your persistent politeness. You didn’t have the heart to tell him you were only needling him because he reminded you of a gruff old barn cat you’d been fond of in your youth.

“About time, toots, I’m starving here,” goads Angel Dust as you walk up with his food, clearly trying to get a rise out of you. You’d hate to disappoint, so you “accidentally” drop his plate from about an inch up, making him jump at the clatter and glare at you. You shoot him a smile that displays every one of your sharp teeth, and dare him to say something. He doesn’t, but only because Vaggie, who’s seated next to him, jabs him when he opens his mouth. You decide to move on before hunting down that adorable pig out of sheer spite becomes too strong of a temptation. You grab Alastor’s plate off the tray the little goat butlers were holding and approach.

“Here you are, hon. Venison, served rare with shrimp jambalaya. Just let me know if you want it cooked a bit more, you hear?”

You bend to place Alastor’s plate in front of him, placing a hand on his shoulder to steady yourself as you straighten up. You feel him tense beneath your grip, but before you can let go and apologize, he relaxes and gives you a Cheshire grin.

“It smells delightful, dear. Was this a family recipe?” he asks as you serve yourself and sit at the last open seat beside him.

“The venison was, yes. But I picked up the recipe for jambalaya while, er, traveling, though Louisiana. It was one of my favorite dishes from the area,” you answer, always happy to discuss food. Alastor tries the dish and his ears perk straight up at the first bite.

“It’s delicious. A real taste of home,” he says sincerely. You feel yourself preening at the compliment but decide to focus on the other part of the statement.

“Oh? Are you from Louisiana, Alastor?” you ask politely as you pick at your own food. Before he can can answer Vaggie cuts in.

“Sure he is. And so are the countless victims he got in his first murder spree, the bastard,” she sneers.

“That’s pretty rude, Vaggie,” Nifty pipes in.

You don’t notice, too busy looking at Alastor for confirmation. He shrugs as if to say “what can ya do” and yeah, you need details. His gaze as he looks at you is almost expectant, which you take as the go ahead for insensitive questions.

“Were the victims actually countless, or do you remember the number?” you ask conversationally, tearing into a particularly tough bite of venison.

By his surprised pause and hesitation, you venture that maybe Alastor wasn’t actually expecting that at all. Whoops. Still, you’re curious, despite the weird looks the other people at the table are giving you before they return to their food and conversations.

“Well by my count, I had a tally of forty-five before I came down here, give or take a couple orphans. Not all of them in Louisiana, though. New Orleans was a charming city to hunt in,” he chirped at you, then tried the venison.

This information sounds familiar to you, and you mull it over for a moment. You’re watching the gratifying scene of everyone moaning over your cooking when it hits you. Alastor was that serial killer from the 30s. The one that news anchor was comparing you to all those years ago. You totally beat his body count, ha!

“That’s impressive,” you say sincerely, keeping your gloating to yourself. You try for some small talk while you eat. “Personally I preferred Lake Charles. The museums and nature trails had their own charm. Plus, the police force was less effective and the casinos drew enough crime that it’s easy to pin any bodies on locals.”

You realize that it’s gotten pretty quiet all of a sudden. You look up to see most of the table looking at you incredulously.

“Whut?” you ask around a mouthful of jambalaya. Slowly their expressions seem to become visibly disturbed and your words catch up to you. You chance a glance at Alastor who is beaming at you, but seems to be sizing you up in a way he hadn’t before. You’re not sure if that means he’s reevaluating you as a threat or as a future meal. You think there might not be a difference.

“What the fuck?” Vaggie glares at you from across the table.

“Hmm?” you say, aiming for nonchalance. “Oh, I was just talking about this lovely little city up topside. Anyways, Angel, where did you get such a cute pig? I’m sure that’s quite a story.”

Your blatant attempt to redirect the conversation fails miserably.

“Nice try, babe, but we meant the bit where you were hiding bodies.”

“I was hardly hiding them,” you snark at Angel Dust, then internally wince. Your past wasn’t something you wanted to bring up at work, but given the hole you’ve just dug yourself, you don’t seem to have much choice

You pick at your food and try to figure out how to put this delicately. You draw a blank and decide to just bite the bullet.

“I was a serial killer when I was alive, though not entirely on purpose,” you concede, then turn to Alastor and tell him, “You were my predecessor actually. They never did catch you, but most of the South-Eastern states still mentioned your work on TV. At least they still did during the late 90s, not sure about now obviously.”

You see him preening out of the corner of your eye as you wait for everyone to digest this information. Alastor looks like he’s about to ask you to elaborate, but is beaten to the punch. Damn. You were hoping he’d take the bait and keep attention off your slip up for a while longer.

“Whaddya mean it wasn’t on purpose?” asks Angel, bewildered. “Didya go around accidentally stabbin’ people, like ‘whoops sorry, guess I killed ya. My bad?’”

You shoot him a cold stare. “Yes, actually.”

“Oh.”

“Well I don’t really give a fuck,” Husk states, spearing meat on his fork and pointing it at you, “as long as you keep up the food. This beats shitty take-out _by miles_ , ya could’a killed the President for all I care.”

“Thanks, Husk,” you beam.

“Wait, no that’s not okay. When were you going to tell us?” Vaggie demands, slamming her hand down on the table. You notice that she’s still scooping up food with her other hand, though. “Don’t you think that’s kind of important information to give your employer?”

“No, not really.” You slice at your venison demurely and ignore her immediate rage. As Vaggie sputters to respond, Charlie puts a hand on her arm to calm her down. She smiles at you uncertainly.

“Well, we’re happy to have you. Besides, this Hotel is meant for second chances. It’s not like you’re planning on stabbing us in our sleep,” she laughs awkwardly, but seems genuine.

“Of course not,” you say smiling back in reassurance, “Just make sure not to startle me and there shouldn’t be any accidents.”

Everyone looks less than reassured, but frankly you’re done with this conversation. You strike up a chat with Nifty, who cheerfully obliges. Eventually everyone settles back into snarking at one another and enjoying the meal. Alastor joins in on your conversation with gusto, gesticulating gleefully and making both you and Nifty giggle at his antics and bloodthirsty anecdotes.

At one point Alastor makes a well-timed cannibalism joke that had you snorting and choking on your shrimp. It was pretty embarrassing at the time, but along with your twitchy tendency to drop food from your fork whenever someone moved too fast, you seemed to have convinced most of the room of your harmlessness. By the end of the meal even Vaggie didn’t look like she found you remotely threatening, which was great. A little upsetting, granted, seeing as you were a very capable serial killer brought down in your prime. But that’s fine. You’re fine with being underestimated. It doesn’t get to you at all.

You rip into the last bit of venison with more force than necessary, then dab delicately at your mouth with a napkin. Around you people are groaning in satisfaction over the meal, which flatters you into a much better mood. You smile as you get up to start putting away plates, and excuse yourself from the table.

By the time you finish washing up and putting the kitchen to rights, most everyone has headed to their rooms for the night, with the exception of your bosses and Alastor.

“Ah, Honey. I was hoping to catch you before I left.”

“Consider me caught,” you smile at him.

He laughs loudly, the sound crackling pleasantly. Vaggie and Charlie wince off to the side, covering their ears, the former glowering at Alastor in displeasure.

“I merely wanted to complement you on the delicious meal.” He offers his hand, and you place your own in his, this time expecting the kiss to your knuckles. You’re still flustered, but manage to keep it off your face. You figure he doesn’t mean anything by it, seeing as he’d acted about as charming and polite to everyone throughout dinner, but you can’t help but be affected. Your accent slips out as a result, but you’re not too fussed about it for once.

“It was my pleasure, and well worth the excellent company,” you offer sincerely with a grin. It’s been some time since you’ve had any real reminders of home, and Alastor has managed to get you properly nostalgic a few times this evening. It’s a good feeling, if a little bittersweet.

Alastor coughs lightly and looked away, straightening his lapels. “Yes, well, I’d best be off. Things to do, people to eat, you know how it is.”

You snicker at his wording, missing Vaggie and Charlie’s shared look of disbelief.

“Ugh,” Vaggie’s huff of distaste brings you back to yourself. You figure you’d better make yourself scarce before anyone gets mauled unnecessarily.

You say a quick goodbye and head off to your room. It’s been a long week and that comfy hotel bed is calling your name. You flop face-first into the covers and let the sweet bliss of oblivion take you. You can hear a faint conversation carry on below you. The faint sound of static soothes you, following you into sleep.

* * *

Alastor collects himself as he watches the small rabbit demon leave the room. Usually his excessive charm was off-putting to lesser demons, or failing that outright ignored. It had been a while since he’d had someone respond to him with a similar demeanor without missing a beat. You were disarmingly genuine, and he wondered at the kind of demon that would smile at him so easily, fully aware of what lay beneath the veneer of civility he displayed.

His first impression of you was of a defensive chef unafraid to confront that uncomfortably sexual spider, something he’d appreciated, however distantly. Your initial skitishness told him you were in possession of some excellent survival instincts. He assumed you’d shy away, and was pleasantly surprised when you took his hand, and further impressed by your politeness. Then he’d lost a bit of his grip on his temper towards that overprotective pest of a demon, and he’d readied himself to deal with the aftermath of a fearful little bunny faced with a predator far above its paygrade.

When you stood unflinching in the wake of his reality-warping display of intimidation, and then invited him to dinner to boot, he wasn’t sure what to think. He thought he’d been mistaken and that maybe you were simply too oblivious to be afraid, or that you were too taken in by his superficial charm to recognize him. His moniker hadn’t come up yet, so he figured he’d wait and see your reaction upon realizing that he was the Radio Demon.

But then the dinner happened and gave him whiplash trying to keep up. You were completely at ease around him, putting your hand on his shoulder and getting in his space without hesitation. Then you had recognized him, not for his carnage in Hell, but for his carnage in life. That alone would have given him pause, much less the fact that you’d only recognized him because you were a serial killer in life yourself!

An accidental one at that, whatever that meant. Perhaps it was slang for something, Alastor really didn’t keep up with what the kids were saying these days. He’d leave that for the try-hards like Sir Pentious.

Regardless, he was at something of a loss for what to think. Especially given the way you kept up with his conversation and sense of humor. Normally Alastor would assume you were trying to ingratiate yourself with him, but you seemed too genuine. He could admit, to himself, at least, that you’d flustered him when you praised his company. He’s brought out of his musing by Vaggie clearing her throat pointedly.

“Charlie, you can head up if you want. I’ll see Alastor out,” she suggested, though her tone brooked no argument. Charlie shot her a grateful look and left the room.

“There’s no need, I’ll be on my way, dear.”

“Yeah, I don’t think so,” she sneers, blocking his way as he turns to exit.

Alastor has done very well for himself in the decades since he came to Hell. No small part of that is due to his ability to smile through frustrating situations in order reap the benefits of his carefully laid plans. This twig of a demon, however, made it very difficult for him to keep his cool. He thinks he’s made it clear to the defensive little manager that he has no intentions of harming her or her girlfriend’s band of miscreants and yet she keeps tempting him to violence.

“The hell kind of game are you playing, _puta cabrón_?” she demands the second they’re left alone.

“This again, dear? I’m not playing games at the moment,” he lied, head tilting as if confused. Of course he was, but certainly none that would affect anyone at the hotel one way or another. This little venture was a means to an end, but for once not one that would likely end in blood. The Hotel’s inhabitants had nothing to fear from him at the moment, as it would be counterproductive to his own interests.

“Right, sure. I don’t know what’s up between you and our new employee, but I’m warning you to back off. You won’t be laying a hand on anyone here,” snarls the irate Latina.

Alastor supposes he should give her credit for her sheer tenacity and stubborn protectiveness, but frankly he’s tired of repeating himself. He can feel his voice distort heavily as he responds, though his tone remains polite.

“I won’t be, no, but then again that’s what I’ve been saying for some time now. I’m beginning to think you don’t listen to me, Vaggie.”

She eyes him warily but seems to accept his answer. He’s sure that won’t last, so he brushes past her, leaving at last. He opens the door and steps out, pausing on the threshold when Vaggie calls out.

“I meant it. Don’t harass my employee.”

His grin is anything but friendly as he turns to face her. “No promises. I’ll be seeing you, sweetheart.”

The door shuts behind him with a click. He has work to do.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my defense the dinner scene kicked my ass. I probably rewrote a good 2000 words like four times and it was depressing. On a higher note, I've been keeping up with the Hazbin livestreams which are a goldmine of of both canon info and general hilarity. I had to restructure the plot of the fic pretty heavily p much every time Vivziepop joined and answered questions, but the good news is I have the next five chapters completely outlined and ready to go. 
> 
> So before I get back to grinding those out, let me just say: Your kudos are my fuel, your comments my lifeblood, so thank you so much for all the support!


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